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Course syllabus Politics, Security and Crisis

Swedish name: Politik, säkerhet och kris

Course code:

2SS065

Valid from semester:

Autumn Term 2026

Education cycle:

Second cycle

Scope:

15.0 credits

Progression:

A1N

Grading scale:

Three-grade scale

Main field of study:

Political Science: Security Studies

Department:

Department of Political Science and Law

Subject:

Political Science

Language of instruction:

The teaching is conducted in English.

Entry requirements

Accepted to the Master's Programme in Politics, Security and Crisis.

Course content and structure

The course shall give the student a qualified social scientific understanding of politics, security and crisis at the interface between recognised academic fields such as security studies and crisis management. While the course presupposes certain prior knowledge in adjacent fields, it shall offer a broad introduction of contemporary theories of security and crisis management. The theories shall be supplemented with a wide range of empirical issues and concrete cases in contemporary security policy and crisis management. The empirical part of the course aims to highlight central analytical themes in the course literature, and link these themes to political and administrative practice.

Type of Instruction

Instruction primarily takes place through mandatory seminars. Seminars provide the student the possibility to develop their independent analysis of the course literature both orally and in written form. The course concludes with an on-campus exam where the student is provided with the opportunity to demonstrate that they have fulfilled the course learning objectives.

Objectives

After completing the course, the student is expected to be able to:

Knowledge and understanding

distinguish between, reproduce and problematize assumptions belonging to rival theoretical approaches with regard to politics, security and crisis.

Competence and skills

in written and verbal form, present analyses that contain well-developed arguments and critical reasoning with clear support in the course literature
based on the theoretical perspectives, convincingly formulate relevant analyses of empirical issues and concrete cases in contemporary security policy and crisis management.

Judgment and approach

critically evaluate possibilities and limitations in foreign and security policy problem solving and the handling of serious crises and societal stressors

Examination formats

Assessment is through an on-campus written exam, as well as active participation in mandatory seminars.

The examiner may decide to request supplementary assignments in order to achieve a passing grade on the course. Supplementary assignments must be completed no later than three working days after the notification of any supplementary assignment, unless there are special reasons approved by the examiner.

Grading

Grades are set according to a three-grade scale: Pass with Distinction (VG), Pass(G) and Fail (U).

To obtain the grade Pass (G) in the course, the student must achieve a passing result on the seminars and the on-campus written exam. To obtain the grade Pass with Distinction (VG) in the course, the student must, over and above fulfilling the requirements for the grade Pass (G), also obtain the grade of Pass with Distinction (VG) for the on-campus written examination. Grading criteria are provided latest at the start of the course.

Restrictions in Number of Examinations

There is no limit on the total number of examination opportunities.

Transitional provisions

When a course is no longer provided or when the content of a course has been significantly altered, the student has the right to be examined in accordance with this course syllabus once per semester over a period of three semesters.

Other regulations

The course cannot be part of a degree whose content matches the content of this course in whole or in part.
On completion of the course, an evaluation will be conducted under the auspices of the course director and will serve as the basis for any changes to the course.
If a student has a decision from the Swedish Defence University regarding special educational support due to a disability, the examiner may decide on alternative forms of examination for the student.

Reading list valid from date 2024-09-02

Reading list decided date: 2024-05-30

Adey, Peter (2009) “Facing Airport Security: Affect, Biopolitics, and the Preemptive Securitisation of the Mobile Body”, Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 27(2): 274-295.

Adler-Nissen, R., K.E. Andersen, & L. Hansen (2020) “Images, emotions, and international politics: the death of Alan Kurdi,” Review of International Studies, 46(1): 75–95

Adler, Emanuel (1997) “Seizing the Middle Ground: Constructivism in World Politics”, European Journal of International Relations, 3(3): 319–363.

Agamben, Giorgio (2000) “What is a Camp?”, in Agamben, Means without End: Notes on Politics, trans. Vincenzo Binetti and Cesare Casarino, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 37-44.

Ansell, C. A. Boin & S. Kuipers (2016) “Institutional Crisis and the Policy Agenda,” in Handbook of Public Policy Agenda Setting. Edward Elgar: 415-431

Bell, Colleen (2006) “Surveillance Strategies and Populations at Risk: Biopolitical Governance in Canada’s National Security Policy”, Security Dialogue 37(2): 147-165.

Bergman-Rosamond, A., T. Gammeltoft-Hansen, M. Hamza, J. Hearn, V. Ramasar & H. Rydstrom (2020) ”The Case for Interdisciplinary Crisis Studies,” Global Discourse: 1-22.

Boin, A., M. Ekengren & M. Rhinard (2020) “Hiding in Plain Sight: Conceptualizing the Creeping Crisis,” Risk, Hazards & Crisis in Public Policy, 11(2): 116–138.

Boin, Arjen (2019) “The Transboundary Crisis: Why We Are Unprepared and the Road Ahead,” Journal of Contingencies and Crisis Management, 27(1): 94–9.

Borg, Stefan (2023) “Cult of irrelevance or broad church? Responsiveness, diversity, and intellectual pluralism in the academic study of security,” European Political Science 22(4): 511–532.
Brassett, James & Nick Vaughan-Williams (2015) “Security and the performative politics of resilience: Critical infrastructure protection and humanitarian emergency preparedness” Security Dialogue, vol. 46(1): 32–50.

Christensen, T., L. Rykkja & P. Lægreid (2016) ”Organizing for Crisis Management: Building Governance Capacity and Legitimacy” Public Administration Review, 76: 887-897

Cohn, Carol (1987) “Sex and Death in the Rational World of Defense Intellectuals”, Signs 12(4): 687-718.

Comfort, Louise, Michael Siciliano & Aya Okada (2011) “Resilience, Entropy, and Efficiency in Crisis Management: The January 12, 2010, Haiti Earthquake” Risk, Hazards & Crisis in Public Policy 2(3): 1-25.
Da Silva Nogueira de Melo, D. and M. Papageorgiou (2021). “Regionalism on the Run: ASEAN, EU, AU and MERCOSUR Responses mid the COVID-19 Crisis”. Partecipazione e Conflitto, 14(1): 57–78.

Deudney, Daniel and G. John Ikenberry (1999) “The Nature and Sources of Liberal International Order”, Review of International Studies, 25(2): 179–96.

Duit, Andreas (2016) “Resilience Thinking: Lessons for Public Administration” Public Administration, 94(2): 364–380.

Dyson, S. B., and P. ‘t Hart (2013). “Crisis Management,” in L. Huddy, D. O. Sears, and J. S. Levy (Eds). The Oxford Handbook of Political Psychology, New York: Oxford University Press: 395-422

Ekengren, M. & S. Hollis (2020) “Explaining the European Union's Security Role in Practice” Journal of Common Market Studies, 58(3): 616-635.

Elbe, Stefan (2006) “Should HIV/AIDS Be Securitized? The Ethical Dilemmas of Linking HIV/AIDS and Security”, International Studies Quarterly 50, 119-144.

Elbe, Stefan (2021) “Bioinformational diplomacy: Global health emergencies, data sharing and sequential life,” European Journal of International Relations, 27(3): 657-681.

Foucault, Michel (1978) “Right of Death and Power over Life”, in History of Sexuality Volume 1, trans. Robert Hurley. New York: Pantheon Books, pp. 130-159.

Hansen, Lene (2000) “The Little Mermaid’s Silent Security Dilemma and the Absence of Gender in the Copenhagen School”, Millennium: Journal of International Studies 29(2): 285-306.

Hermann, M. G. (1979) “Indicators of Stress in Policymakers during Foreign Policy Crises” Political Psychology, 1(1): 27-46

Ikenberry, G. John (2018) “The End of Liberal International Order?”, International Affairs, 94(1): 7-23.

Kinnvall. C. (2023) “Covid-19: crisis, emotional governance and populist fantasy narratives” International Relations, 37(1): 156–163.

Kirkwood, S. (2019) “History in the Service of Politics: Constructing Narratives of History During the European Refugee ‘Crisis’,” Political Psychology, 40(2): 297-313

Krause, Keith and Michael Williams (2018) “Security and ‘Security studies’: Conceptual Evolution and Historical Transformation” in Alexandra Gheciu and William C. Wohlforth (eds) The Oxford Handbook of International Security. Oxford: OUP.

Kuipers, Sanneke and Nicholas H. Welsh (2017) “Taxonomy of the Crisis and Disaster Literature: Themes and Types in 34 Years of Research,” Risk, Hazards & Crisis in Public Policy 8(4): 272-283.

Kuteleva, Anna and Sarah J. Clifford (2021) ” Gendered securitisation: Trump’s and Putin’s discursive politics of the COVID-19 pandemic”, European Journal of International Security 6(3): 301-317.
Marhia, Natasha (2013) “Some Humans Are More Human Than Others: Troubling the ‘Human’ in Human Security from a Critical Feminist Perspective”, Security Dialogue 44(1): 19-35.

McConnell, A. & P. ’t Hart (2019) “Inaction and public policy: understanding why policymakers ‘do nothing’,” Policy Sciences 52: 645–661.

McConnell, Allan (2020) The Politics of Crisis Terminology. Oxford Encyclopedia of Crisis Analysis. Published online: 30 January 2020.

Mearsheimer, John (2019) “Bound to Fail: The Rise and Fall of the Liberal International Order”, International Security 43(4): 7-50.

Mearsheimer, John (2022) “John Mearsheimer on why the West is principally responsible for the Ukrainian crisis,” The Economist, March 19th.

Mitzen, Jennifer (2006) “Ontological Security in World Politics: State Identity and the Security Dilemma”, European Journal of International Relations, 12(3): 341–370.

Morgenthau, Hans J. (2014 [1946]) “The Moral Blindness of Scientific Man”, in C. Elman and M.A. Jensen (eds.) Realism Reader. London: Routledge, pp. 47-52.

Morgenthau, Hans J. (2014 [1985]) “A Realist Theory of International Politics”, in C. Elman and M.A. Jensen (eds.), Realism Reader. London: Routledge, pp. 53-59.

Morisi, D. and M. Wagner (2019) “Anxiety, Fear, and Political Decision Making,” in Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics. Oxford University Press.

Olsson, E. K. & B. Verbeek (2013) “International Organizations and Crisis Management”, in B. Reinalda (Ed.). Routledge Handbook of International Organization. New York: Routledge.

Parker, C., D. Nohrstedt, J. Baird, H. Hermansson, O. Rubin & E. Baekkeskov (2020) “Collaborative Crisis Management: A Plausibility Probe of Core Assumptions” Policy and Society, 39(4): 510–529.

Pichler, Hans-Karl (1998) “The Godfathers of ‘Truth’: Max Weber and Carl Schmitt in Morgenthau’s Theory of Power Politics”, Review of International Studies 24(2): 185-200.

Roux-Dufort, C. (2007) “Is Crisis Management (Only) a Management of Exceptions?” Journal of Contingencies and Crisis Management, 15(2): 105-114.

Schmitt, Carl (1996/2007 [1932]) The Concept of the Political, translated and with an introduction by G. Schwab. Chicago: Chicago University Press, pp. 3-79.

Sjoberg, Laura (2009). “Introduction to Security Studies: Feminist Contributions”, Security Studies 18(2): 183-213.

Stark, Alastair (2014) “Bureaucratic Values and Resilience: An Exploration of Crisis Management Adaptation” Public Administration, 92(3): 692–706.

Stern, E. K. (2003) “Crisis Studies and Foreign Policy Analysis: Insights, Synergies, and Challenges,” International Studies Review, 5(2): 155-202

Tickner, J. Anne (1988) “Hans Morgenthau’s Principles of Political Realism: A Feminist Reformulation”, Millennium 17(3):429-440.

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van Hecke, S., H. Fuhr & W. Wolfs (2021) “The politics of crisis management by regional and international organizations in fighting against a global pandemic: the member states at a crossroads” International Review of Administrative Sciences, 87(3): 672–690.

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Weldes, Jutta (1996) “Constructing National Interests”, European Journal of International Relations, 2(3): 275–18.

Wendt, Alexander (1994) “Collective Identity Formation and the International State”, American Political Science Review 88(2): 384-396.

Wilcox, Lauren (2009) “Gendering the Cult of the Offensive,” Security Studies 18(2): 24-40.

Wilkinson, Claire (2007) “The Copenhagen School on Tour in Kyrgyzstan: Is Securitization Theory Useable Outside Europe?” Security Dialogue 38 (1), pp. 5-25.

Williams, Michael C. (2003) “Words, Images, Enemies: Securitization and International Politics”, International Studies Quarterly 47(4): 511–31.

Wæver, Ole (1995) “Securitization and Desecuritization”, in R. Lipschutz (ed.), On Security. New York: Columbia University Press, pp. 46-86.